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PEOPLE IN IRELAND love live music, but two thirds say the high cost of tickets is a barrier to them attending concerts, according to research commissioned by the Irish Music Rights Organisation.
IMRO published a report on research into the state of the Irish music industry today that showed that the average adult in Ireland spends almost €1,000 per year on music related products and services, and that the industry as a whole contributes €1 billion to the economy annually.
Live events are the most popular way people spend money on music, generating €786 million annually, IMRO’s report said.
On average, Irish adults spent €757 on music events last year.
Big venue concerts accounted for the largest share, with people spending €298 on tickets.
This was closely followed by music festivals, which drew an average spend of €194.
While people spend plenty of money on music events, the IMRO report said that “many members of the public are feeling the pinch”.
Two thirds (66%) of adults flagged the cost of tickets as the main barrier to attending gigs.
Almost half (49%) also cited high accommodation costs as an issue when considering going to music events.
Hotels have angered the public and been called out by politicians for hiking room prices around the times of high-profile performances. The upcoming Oasis reunion tour has been no exception and was highlighted by Tánaiste Simon Harris last year.
“I would encourage everybody to engage fairly in relation to this. The issues around price gouging, around hiking up things at the time of major events, doesn’t actually help anyone but ends up giving our city bad reputation,” he said.
Coldplay fans felt the sting of high accommodation prices when the band played in Croke Park last year.
Ticketmaster, which dominates the market for concert ticket sales, has also come in for criticism from music fans for its use of “dynamic pricing”, which increases the cost of tickets based on demand.
The cost of tickets for the upcoming Oasis tour caused enough outrage among the public that a bill is now in the works that would make dynamic pricing illegal.
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Fantastic piece of journalism
- “Brexit was Johnson’s England project. Northern Ireland an afterthought.”
Johnson reasoned as follows: ‘If I back Brexit, then if Leave wins I can be PM, but if it doesn’t I can still wriggle my way into No. 10. But if I back staying in the EU, Remain needs to win for me to be PM, and if it’s Leave I’m done for.’ In other words, backing Brexit left him with both possible worlds to be PM, instead of just one.
So in that sense he was being entirely rational, except that Northern Ireland wasn’t even an afterthought, since he simply didn’t care. He rode on a wave of what was essentially an ‘English independence’ vote, and ended up shafting all of Ireland in the process. Including even the DUP. It’s hard to feel sorry for that sorry bunch, but to my own astonishment I’ve actually ended up pitying them.
@Mick Tobin: Nice analysis, he even prepared both positions.
@Mick Tobin: Well said. Nail on head.
When Ress-Mogg becomes PM, there will be a tectonic shift.
@François Pignon: oh no !!!Ress-Mogg, worse than Boris….
@Maurice Whelan: It won’t be Moggy but it’s hard to say which way this going to go. Defence secretary Ben Wallace is a frontrunner with the bookies, apparently because he’s seen as the somewhat boring (this is a plus) mirror image of Johnson, a steady hand who’d be pragmatic when it comes to relations with the EU, and hence with Ireland.
Incidentally a name like that might get Scottish nationalists worried. But it could still be Liz Truss, who might be even worse than Johnson (and therefore better for the SNP). We’ll have to wait and see I guess.
@Mick Tobin: The Scots just need the Tories to stay in power. They are so despised in Scotland it won’t really matter who the PM is in my opinion, although someone like Truss would be good for independence.
SNP worst nightmare would be not getting a referendum in this government term and Labour winning the next general election. However, Labour cant win a general election as they can’t win without Scottish votes and the SNP have Scotland sown up. Tories don’t need a single vote in Scotland to get into number 10 and that is the difference. Tories will continue to govern the U.K. for the foreseeable.
He must have forgot that NI politics was Fecked well before Borris came along.
Great article and shows that the press have to write a lot of the pieces through gritted teeth
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